Thyist
by Esther Honoria
Summary: Columbia gathers a few supplies.
1. Pearline

~oOo~

Columbia breathed in deeply, pushing herself to keep walking. To keep from giving into the idea of never going back, setting up digs in a deserted garage.

She'd put streaks of blue in her hair, light blue along with pink. Bright pink. And in the heat, the way it was beaming down on her, she thought the colors might be fading onto her skin. She wiped the back of her hand over her forehead and sighed, faint purple near her temple.

She'd hitched a ride with a Transylvanian, and on her way back to the motorbike, she carried a brown paper bag containing potato chips, candy peanuts, Kool-Aid drink mix and cigarettes.

There were pearls in her hair; her outfit a pair of clasped shells, a long skirt. She felt a sharp burst of energy under the skin of her neck, like a needle, a record needle lowered, a memory of where she'd last been kissed.

The kiss hadn't been Eddie's.

She hadn't even seen Eddie for days, knowing he was shacked up with Frank in the upper levels of the castle. Rock music, saxophone, the doctor's deep laughter. His imagined eyes rolling to white. _BABY!_

The kiss had been Magenta's.

Late, late enough that the TV was a rainbow. She hadn't seen the TV, the maid approaching, only Una Merkel, only Carmen Miranda, only the pages of Life as they were almost folded under the hand of the burgundy woman. She didn't know what she'd said, Magenta, but she'd bent and kissed her goodnight. Something about being quiet about Tom and Jerry. Still something. And the moon half covered under a yellow gauze.

Now under her nails was that kiss. Were those lips.

The fingers, with the memory, were brought and pressed to her mouth.

She walked over the empty parking lot, one foot over the other. The road to her side was empty, the wind so warm over her, reaching to her from the ground, clawing. She felt the fingers at her throat but kept the laugh to herself: she saw the flames. The neon lights. She walked under a street lamp, knowing it would extinguish as soon as she came near. In its darkness she inhaled, tilting her head to a side, drowning. The bag went softly to her feet, her hands in the air, stretching, moving from side to side.

The doll on the bike was playing a song she liked. "Lay it on me, mister."

And with that he turned the volume up.

She danced over the parking area, over the grass in the cracks, the lines and glass. She slowed to sway in a circle, extending her arms as they do in movies. The way all move in circles to accept snow, rain, come to me, enter me. Columbia accepted the night, the orange-blue dead rays behind the plastic-glass of the lamp.

~oOo~


	2. Friday

A/N: The song is Goldfrapp's _We Radiate._

~oOo~

The maid was in the Zen room, one leg dangled over an arm. A cigarette of some sort wilted between stained fingers, its ashes falling to a waiting tray, the floor. Her thick rust tinted hair was as wool, an escaping fan at both sides of her pale face. She appeared lost, almost asleep, clad in a tight-fitting black cotton pantsuit, stirrups over low heels. One foot in the air shook with the music of the room, the music of her head, trying to stay awake.

She turned her half-lidded eyes to Columbia, silently watching her as she walked past, making her way to her room. Their room.

The air was thick, warm without air conditioning, and the woman of working status could hear herself breathing laboriously. She could feel over her stomach, her legs, where the servant, her brother, had just been. Torrid, the material was creased in those areas and pressed to her skin.

Columbia made her way down the hall, the paper in her hands worn thin. She discerned Magenta's steps as they followed her, but she didn't make any acknowledgement of their sound. She could see her in her head, she could feel her weight on the steps as she moved with the tinny music from the floors above.

Columbia's face was drawn, glittering with sweat and stars as she finally stepped into confinement. Setting the bag on a surface not as crowded as the others, she removed the circus peanuts and ripped open the bag, stuffing an orange candy into her mouth before crawling into bed, chewing as though a ballplayer.

She found Magenta standing beside her, hand extended, offering whatever she'd been smoking. Columbia accepted, taking a few a drags before returning it, recognizing it as _cheap._

She saw the frizzy back of Magenta's head as she crept to the monitor, a shoulder swept downward. Her lips moved, lyrics in a whisper leaving. Breathless rasps.

 _Hahaha_

 _You're Heaven_

 _HaHaha_

 _We radiate._

She moved with the music as she brought the monitor's screen to life. A black and white picture of reality. The scene that played out was of Frank laying in bed as he fanned himself with a torn magazine page. His legs were crossed, exposed in a house-dress. "Oh Lord," he moaned to himself.

Columbia watched him for a few seconds before deciding that the woman in the room was of more interest. She ate another peanut, shoved the bag to her side, and raised from the bed, soon lost in a half-hearted dance. Her moves mirrored those of the other.

Magenta had her hands, loose fingers brought high over her head, guiding her with shifts to the side. An impromptu dialogue. Columbia scooted backwards, diving away from Magenta, Magenta swooped toward the other girl's frame. A bird on wing, an inked vulture out of frame.

Not too long after their dance had begun to fade, the door to their room opened to reveal the doctor. He had changed into a ladies' 1940s one-piece swimsuit, white with a pattern of red and yellow hibiscus blooms. A large tropical flower made of velvet was pinned in the curls alongside his cheek. Teal shadows played about his eyes as a plastic diamond rested on each temple.

His hand could be heard rapping against the door frame, waking them from dreams. A sudden reprimanding of children. "Make yourselves presentable, we're going to the pool." He slipped back between the door and frame out to the hall. _"Eddie?"_ A wicker basket could be heard creaking.

The 'pool' in question was not the one inside, but a temporary addition made to the grounds, one created when a shallow hollow had become filled with water after a heavy rain. A few lawn chairs were set along its desolate shore, an umbrella shaded table, an aluminum reflector. A large fallen tree was to its side, next to it a cooler holding Nehi, 7-Up. A few nights before, Eddie had made a fire and cooked over the flames hamburgers on a makeshift grill.

Magenta, out of breath, had thrown herself in a chair beside the monitor of the room. The sylph bolted to nearby pile of clothes, removing from the mess a dark article of clothing which she threw over her shoulder to Magenta. She held the captured maillot to the light, seeing the walls, the pictures, through its lace. Solid black covered only patches. The maid began slowly to remove her shoes.

When Columbia finally uncovered her bathing suit from the mess, she quickly peeled off what she'd been wearing to tug over her sticky legs and waist a lime green strapless one-piece ending in a ruffled skirt. A stark contrast to her bright hair. The colors would wash away, they had already all but left her.

She walked to the chair holding Magenta, and pulled at the zipper going down her back, exposing the line of her spine. A finger traced the hint upwards.

~oOo~


	3. Angles

A/N: For FireandBloodandKittens, roseangel21, and guest. Thank you.

~oOo~

Magenta's face was beaded with ruby-colored lights. As stones, lightened rods, they as a triangle of fire hues reached out in beams as her face appeared above water. Her body was covered by a shattered image; a world of carnival glass, a barrier that could only with the risk of life be entered. Her limbs moved slowly in the golden light.

The world was lost to her. Ears covered, eyes closed, dark strokes of lashes stuck to her wet cheeks.

Columbia watched her, watched over her, from where she rested against the line of shore. Her head was turned, viewing the world from the corners of sight and over her nose. The water around Magenta was all she could hear beside the arms of her sunglasses hitting against their black-and-white checkered frame.

The others in the party had left. Someone had purchased a fudge cake. Columbia was fine with the crumbled remains, Magenta wanted none.

There were white lights in the trees, paper lanterns strewn over a clothes line, some fallen admist weeds. Crows momentarily flew overhead, and a breeze followed them touching both women. There were whispers of autumn and the leaves that would fall then. Fall to be under their feet.

Columbia eased back into the water, sliding beneath its surface, seeing black ink bleeding up from a bed she couldn't find. Shining above her in silver was the distorted sky.

Finding herself by Magenta, the body underwater, her hands ghosted over the skin she had seen before. She saw bare white legs in the dull light as though an image from beyond death, beyond reach. Feeling her presence beneath, the drifting body moved. Columbia impulsively raised with the woman from the depths.

Magenta was taken aback, deprived of her senses. She gasped as Columbia's face emerged beside hers. Her red hair was now dark and in her eyes, close to the outline of her skull.

Water as a second skin left Columbia's face, dripping from her nose. Taking in the air again she knew only salt at first, the cavities above eyes, the taste of her mouth. Then she took in the other woman. Magenta at the moment smelled of the rose tissues found in certain hotels. They made Columbia for an instant think of spent blood and violet pastels. An oil lamp with a red shade she'd seen in a film she couldn't place.

Magenta's ears stood out in a way the sequined woman wasn't used to. Stood out against her wet hair and face, her thin neck. Columbia traced over them with the tip of an index finger.

The domestic's eyes were slightly reddened, even without make-up. Columbia didn't know why they were, but didn't let the question stop her as she pressed her mouth to hers. Pressed it to the tears and away, gripping her bare arm to anchor her to the earth and to the water. She threaded her fingers through her hair, over her collar bone.

Like electricity, like rain, like dimmed lights, Magenta welcomed the touch, returned the touch. Brought her hands to cover Columbia, her hands to cover the hands of the other and carry them to where they hadn't strayed already. And she saw the lights, she saw the trees. She saw the back of the castle and the glowing windows.

She went deaf in one ear, deaf but for the sound of her heart, the water nestled inside amplifying all. The noises Magenta made, the water made; that she made and she couldn't have enough. She couldn't stop, no, not for nothing.

~oOo~


End file.
